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Frustration

Hey folks,

I have been beekeeping for 10 months now and am getting a little frustrated. One thing is that we have had a cold spring here in middle GA and the bees are expanding at a snails pace. Or, maybe I'm just impatient.

Here's what happened today. I went into my hives to check them out. The queen from hive 4 was removed due to bad temperament on March 20. A new queen was put in on March 21. About March 27 (don't have my notebook handy) she was released from the cage. She had been in one of those push in cages that goes over the comb. She was accepted and began laying. Today I open hive 4 and find 4-5 queen cells. I look around and I see all stages of brood, even some eggs that look like they were laid this morning. I keep looking but cannot find the queen. Then, purely by accident, I see a virgin queen walking around. Today has been exactly 17 days since the old queen was removed.

My theory: During the queen introduction process I failed to remove all of the queen cells that they made. Today or yesterday, that queen cell hatched and they threw out my nice new queen. I'm going to let them be. I hate that her genetics are going to be the same as the old one that had a bad attitude, but I really don't want to try to requeen them again. It's frustrating because all I really ended up doing was setting them back a few weeks on buildup and I'm trying my best to get them ready for the nectar flow.

Re: Frustration

Bad manager. I don't like that.
I like BeeCurious' idea about not keeping aggressive bees. Pretty soon you have to rehive all your queens in
every hive because they have the aggressive genetics. I think the drones will carry that as well, right.
Two to 3 generations will tell this process. Get them while it is still early in the season. At least in my area
it is at early spring here. The flow will continue until August or so. I think you still have the chance to take
care of this hive. Maybe buy more queens to make more split from this hive. That way they cannot throw
out your queens because they have to accept her being so small size. Of course, if you can tolerate them
then let them bee. Other folks here will ban them to the boonie already. Only go there once to steal their
honey later on. One time aggression is better than all the time, right. I would take her out. It takes the
fun out of beekeeping with aggressive hive.